Oxbow Union High School girls basketball coach Brian Musty leads his team during a game against Montpelier. He is facing charges of sexual misconduct with a girl who was then a student.

CHELSEA — The former Oxbow Union High School coach accused of repeatedly having sexual contact with a student has agreed to serve seven months in prison and the rest of his life on probation in the case.

Brian Musty, 44, of Topsham, pleaded guilty in Orange County criminal court in Chelsea Friday to one count of felony sexual assault of a minor. Musty agreed to a sentence of three years to life, all suspended except seven months. The case had been scheduled to go to trial on Tuesday, but now Musty awaits sentencing after completion of a pre-sentence investigation.

Musty was fired in February 2013 after school officials completed an internal investigation into his time at the school, according to published reports. He is free on $20,000 bail.

According to the Orange County Sheriff’s Department affidavit, the woman told investigators that Musty had sex with her “at least a hundred times,” starting when she was 15 and he was 28. The woman told investigators the incidents happened at his home in Topsham; at Oxbow Union High School, including in a shower room between the coaches’ offices; in his car while traveling to and from the school; and at his family’s camp on Lake Armington in Piermont, N.H. The woman reported that Musty told her after she graduated from high school not to tell anyone about the incidents, saying, “You know you can’t ever tell anybody about anything happening. ... It would ruin my career and my family,” according to investigators.

Musty was arrested in November 2012 after a phone call between him and the woman was recorded by an investigator with the Orange County Special Investigations Unit on Nov. 1, 2012. According to the affidavit, during that call, Musty told the woman “nothing like that has ever happen (sic) since,” “I guess for me it was something like if it was just sex ... I would have stopped calling you ... once (you) got married and moved away and stuff,” and “maybe we did some things we should not have.” Musty repeatedly mentioned caring about the woman and making mistakes, and said, “I mean, it’s kind of why I got into teaching phys ed (to) try to help kids through high school,” investigators reported. The incidents came to light after the woman told a therapist about what happened between her and Musty. School Athletic Director Richard Thornton said in a February 2012 interview Mustybegan coaching middle school baseball and basketball between 1989 and 1991, and had been teaching at Oxbow since 1994. Musty coached his team to the Division III girls basketball state title in March 2012 at the Barre Municipal Auditorium.

In court Friday, Orange County State’s Attorney William Porter said the woman planned to attend Musty’s sentencing, but would have to make arrangements to get to Chelsea as she now lives in a different part of the country. Judge Robert P. Gerety said when it looked like the pre-sentence investigation was close to completion and the case close to sentencing, he would be in contact with Porter and Musty’s attorney David Sleigh to set a date for sentencing that worked for the woman so she could attend.